If Only I knew yesterday what I know today…

October 11, 2008

If Only I knew yesterday what I know today...

This evening I came back to Aberdare Coliseum to see Frank Vickery’s Erogenous Zones for a second time this week.

I saw it from a different angle.

This new perspective was nothing to do with the change of seating.

More the fact I was alone.

“Alone” save a few hundred other theatregoers and my feelings for company.

This feeling of joyful alienation.

This feeling of enchantment.

This feeling of escape.

This feeling of being mesmerised listening to the rhythms of Frank’s writing.

This feeling of being delighted by split dialogue and conspiratorial narrative.

This feeling of sadness.

In a reverie in the play’s interval my thoughts dwelled on Ysgol Gyfun Rhydfelen.

At Rhydfelen, the drama department was for many years a means to one man’s end.

That man would use children as objects to satisfy his deprave psychological and sexual needs.

If Only I knew yesterday what I know today...

My heart aches and tears well in my eyes thinking of how many children were denied the joys of drama at Ysgol Gyfun Rhydfelen.

But my heart is uplifted as I recall memories of being a trainee teacher in North Wales in the mid nineties and taking a school theatre trip to Rhyl with a teacher called John.

John the writer who bristled with honesty.

John the Geordie who loved to write shit-hot sonnets and printed them on Christmas Cards with cute drawings by his two kids.

John the Catholic friend who talked about bullying in the staff room and held my hand at my first drama classes.

John the not-John-Owen teacher who loved the children but did not want to bully them or play with them or fuck them leaving his dirty fingerprints on their bodies and minds.

And my heart is filled with joy as I remember the shows I have seen at Aberdare Coliseum over recent years where the children of my brothers and sister have danced and sang and performed representing their own ysgol.

If this is maudlin for you, I apologise. I merely attempt to tell you my truth. This theatre is a retreat where I feel safe and converse with ghosts, share a laugh, or shed a tear. Vickery’s writing stirs my feelings.

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If Only I knew yesterday what I know today…

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